Abstract
The Art Sound Environment (ASE) project aims to analyze the relationship between art, sound and landscape in Italian artistic research from the 1960s to the present, with particular attention to processual, installation and participatory interventions, realized outdoors, often in decentralized, peripheral and marginal places of the peninsula. Central themes of the contemporary debate will be considered as a theoretical and methodological perspective of comparison and analysis: the politics of cultural decentralization, the "third landscape" (Clément 2005), sustainability (Ferrari, La Vergata 2009), relational aesthetics (Bourriaud 2010), immersivity in visual studies (Pinotti 2021), ecofeminism and practices of care (Warren 1990; Mies, Shiva 1993; Cima, Marcomin, 2017; Zamboni 2020), posthuman ecologies (Braidotti, Bignall 2018), marginality as a cultural and creative value (Hooks 2020; Di Marino 2021), and the deconstruction of colonial stereotypes, which not only concern relations with non-Western civilizations but also touch on areas of the South and the provinces in general (Faeta 2003). In this vision of analysis and research, linguistic contamination opens up new interstitial spaces of inquiry and nonlinear historicization that disrupt the canon of the "grand narrative" progressive, central, and dominant. The concepts of "centre" and "periphery" turn out to be increasingly unstable and demand to be rethought today (Tassone, 2018). The periphery is not always necessarily willing to flatten itself on the centre but responds to it through resistances that produce unsuspected graft (Castelnuovo, Ginzburg 2019). Focusing on the aural dimension, in particular, amounts to exploring a new epistemological model (Midolo 2007), a cultural paradigm within which sound is configured as a device capable of redesigning rural areas, frontier zones and geographies emerging from the post-global context (Pisano 2017). The project aims to map outdoor environmental and sound art interventions carried out on the Italian territory and to produce a multimedia archive that will gather documentary materials (textual, visual and sound) related to these interventions. This archive will facilitate and expedite research by that large and growing part of the scientific community interested in such issues from multiple perspectives: art history, sociology, anthropology, musicology, and cognitive science. Through practices at the centre of the contemporary curatorial debate, the collected materials will flow into exhibition projects that will allow the dissemination of research in different scientific and popular contexts. The collaboration with some museums and research centres reported in the project will allow organizing moments of sharing research through conferences, talks, screenings, publications and an exhibition. Results Achieved The first activity carried out as part of the project was an exhibition on Piero Mottola, one of the protagonists of Italian sound-art research, at the Centro Arti Opificio Siri in Terni, the city museum, from 4 May to 16 June. The Bologna Unit organized also three lecturers on John Cage and Fluxus in October 22th, November 25th and December 11th 2024 at the Department of Arts, University of Bologna, with the collaboration of Elisa Bernardini and realized the seminar on John Cage and the Italian landscape in May 9th 2025 at the Department of Arts, University of Bologna. The seminar featured speeches by young scholars such as Elisa Bernardini, Sveva Carnevale and Valeria D’Urso and a panel discussion with some historical witnesses, namely Gianni Dessì (artist), Franco Masotti (artistic director of Ravenna Festival), Veniero Rizzardi (musicologist) and Oderso Rubini (record producer). The seminar concluded with the screening of the video In Search of the Lost Silence. John Cage’s Train (2008). The Teramo Unit organised ‘Vetri nel mare’ [Glasses in the Sea] in July-August 2024 at the Tourist Port of Giulianova (Teramo) with performances and concerts. Partners in the initiative included the Giulianova Civic Museum Centre, the Port Authority, the Riccitelli Music Society and Tercas Foundation. Than the Teramo Unit organized a seminar titled Itinerari sonori. Orientarsi tra ricerca e progettazione dell’immateriale at State Higher Institute of Music Studies “G. Braga” in Teramo, January 9, 2024 – June 21, 2025, with a series of lectures that involve experts in the relationship between music, art, sound and space. The Roma Tre Unit realized a seminar on Alvin Curran at the Department of Philosophy and Communication, Roma Tre University, in April 10th 2025. The seminar featured speeches by contemporary art historian such as Ilaria De Sanctis (Roma Tre University), Francesca Gallo (Sapienza University), Paola Lagonigro (Roma Tre University), Giulia Pedace (MAXXI, Rome) and musicologist such as Alessandro Mastropietro (University of Catania) and Giovanni Vacca (Roma Tre University). The seminar will conclude with a panel discussion with Lara Conte and Pasquale Fameli. Than the same Unit realized a talk and performance program held at the Palladium Theatre in June 5th 2025 and titled Suonare la città. Dall’azione all’ecologia dell’ascolto. The day's programme included a round table discussion entitled Suonare la città. Omaggio a Giuseppe Chiari [Playing the city. Tribute to Giuseppe Chiari], introduced and moderated by Lara Conte, Pasquale Fameli and Francesca Gallo, with scholars and experts such as Mattia Cavoli (University of L'Aquila), Mario Chiari (Giuseppe Chiari Archive), Livia De Pinto (University for Foreigners of Siena), Ilaria De Sanctis (Roma Tre University), Marianna Lucarini (Roma Tre University), Giulia Pedace (Head of the MAXXI Art and Documentation Archive Centre) and Daniele Vergni (Sapienza University of Rome). This was followed by a series of performances focused on listening: Dell’azione negatrice by Mauro Folci; Camminata di ascolto in the Garbatella district by the Stalker group, with a sound proposal by Julie Faubert, in collaboration with Daniela Angelucci and Francesco Careri (Roma Tre University); Ritratto di M., sound performance by Sara Basta in dialogue with Marzia Coronati and in collaboration with Iuno, Rome. At 9 p.m., at the Palladium Theatre, Alvin Curran's concert-performance entitled ‘Endangered Species’ also took place. On 3th November 2025, the Roma Tre Unit organized a talk with the artist Elena Bellantoni at the Teatro Palladium in Rome. The discussion focused on the use of sound within the artist’s relational practices and also involved the art historian Lara Conte (Roma Tre University); the sociologist Antonietta De Feo (Roma Tre University); and the art historians Pasquale Fameli (University of Bologna) and Laura Iamurri (Roma Tre University). For over two years The Bologna and Roma Tre units together have worked on the creation of the website that will house the archive of the materials filed and digitised with the support of the Roma Tre computer office. Together with the assignees, the model of the card for the cataloguing of the mapped materials was also defined. The website was implemented and now is online. It can be visited at: https://ase.uniroma3.it/ On 20th and 21th November 2025, the Bologna Unit organized the final conference, Arte Suono Ambiente. Verso una nuova ecologia dell’ascolto, held at the DAMSLab Theatre. The conference provided an opportunity for a collective and unified reflection on the project’s themes, involving scholars from various Italian universities, as well as theorists, artists, and curators who have long been engaged in the study, promotion, and interpretation of these practices. The first session featured a presentation of the project and its results, including the digital mapping of numerous artistic interventions from the 1960s to the present, alongside contributions addressing theoretical, curatorial, and operational issues. Participants included the theorist and Sound Art scholar Leandro Pisano (PhD, University of Naples Federico II); the art historian Cecilia Canziani, professor at the Accademia di Belle Arti in Rome and curator of the forthcoming Italian Pavilion at the Venice Biennale; and the artist and theorist Carlo Infante. The first session concluded with a dialogue between the artist Luca Vitone and Roberto Pinto, art critic and curator. The second session focused on the relationship between art, sound, and territoriality, examined from both art-historical and aesthetic perspectives. Speakers included the theatre historian Piersandra Di Matteo (IUAV University of Venice); the artist and curator Mili Romano, former professor at the Accademia di Belle Arti in Bologna; and Rita Pamela Ladogana (University of Cagliari). The session concluded with a lecture by Raffaele Milani, Professor of Aesthetics at the University of Bologna and a scholar of landscape studies, in dialogue with Monica Sassatelli (University of Bologna). During the days of the conference, an exhibition was also installed and inaugurated in the DAMSLab Foyer, featuring a selection of the artistic interventions studied and digitized, with the aim of illustrating some of the many ways in which the relationship between art, sound, and environment has developed. The exhibition was officially opened at the end of the first session. The inauguration was followed by a participatory performance by Carlo Infante / Urban Experience, which engaged the audience in a distinctive acoustic experience—a peripatetic debate in the vicinity of the DAMSLab. The Roma Tre Unit oversaw the publication of a substantial monographic study by Livia De Pinto on the artist and musician Giuseppe Chiari, one of the figures most extensively investigated within the framework of the PRIN project. The volume, published by Mimesis in February 2026, is based on in-depth research conducted primarily at the Giuseppe Chiari Archive, which had previously remained inaccessible.
Dettagli del progetto
Responsabile scientifico: Pasquale Fameli
Strutture Unibo coinvolte:
Dipartimento delle Arti
Coordinatore:
ALMA MATER STUDIORUM - Università di Bologna(Italy)
Contributo totale di progetto: Euro (EUR) 223.186,00
Contributo totale Unibo: Euro (EUR) 104.000,00
Durata del progetto in mesi: 24
Data di inizio
30/11/2023
Data di fine:
28/02/2026
